I'm Thankful for............My Love Letters!
The first time I heard the Bible called our love letters was from Tim my pastor one Sunday morning while preaching. I thought to myself hmmmm.....what a great way to think of the Bible, my love letters. If you stop and think about it its true; it's God's love expressed to us in 66 books and it was written just for us.
It is filled with wonderful stories! Stories of miracles, restoration, healing, salvation. There are stories of lions, of giants, of mighty floods, of a couple fish feeding thousands. Stories we love to tell our children and stories our children love to hear us tell! I just read the story of Saul/Paul a man who spent his time persecuting the church, totally turn his life around and start serving Christ. What an amazing story of complete and utter transformation!
It is also filled with teachings. It teaches us what we need to do to become more like Christ, to conform more into his image. It teaches how to live lives worthy of being called a child of God. It teaches us faith, endurance, perseverance, forgiveness, righteousness; love ...the list goes on. It is a place we can go to find answers to our toughest questions and believe me there is always an answer to whatever you are asking!
Most of all it is our spiritual food. Our physical body needs food to survive, so do our spiritual bodies need God's word to survive. Without it we become weak, self centered, at risk of falling into temptation and unable to do the work God has for us to do. We must make time, as my friend Amanda always puts it to "spend time in the word" It is our nourishment and it is essential to our spiritual vitality and we must make spending time in it a priority of our day.
I don't want to do it out of habit, just skimming through a few chapters to be able to say that I read the Bible today, I want to read it as if my life depended on it! I don't want to just memorize scriptures, I want to hide them away in my heart so it penetrates and transfuses itself into my whole being. I want to reflect it's teachings in the way I live. I want to make its promises, my hope for each day.
I urge each of you to do the same. Spend time in God's word; after all it is your love letters from God!
It is filled with wonderful stories! Stories of miracles, restoration, healing, salvation. There are stories of lions, of giants, of mighty floods, of a couple fish feeding thousands. Stories we love to tell our children and stories our children love to hear us tell! I just read the story of Saul/Paul a man who spent his time persecuting the church, totally turn his life around and start serving Christ. What an amazing story of complete and utter transformation!
It is also filled with teachings. It teaches us what we need to do to become more like Christ, to conform more into his image. It teaches how to live lives worthy of being called a child of God. It teaches us faith, endurance, perseverance, forgiveness, righteousness; love ...the list goes on. It is a place we can go to find answers to our toughest questions and believe me there is always an answer to whatever you are asking!
Most of all it is our spiritual food. Our physical body needs food to survive, so do our spiritual bodies need God's word to survive. Without it we become weak, self centered, at risk of falling into temptation and unable to do the work God has for us to do. We must make time, as my friend Amanda always puts it to "spend time in the word" It is our nourishment and it is essential to our spiritual vitality and we must make spending time in it a priority of our day.
I don't want to do it out of habit, just skimming through a few chapters to be able to say that I read the Bible today, I want to read it as if my life depended on it! I don't want to just memorize scriptures, I want to hide them away in my heart so it penetrates and transfuses itself into my whole being. I want to reflect it's teachings in the way I live. I want to make its promises, my hope for each day.
I urge each of you to do the same. Spend time in God's word; after all it is your love letters from God!
posted by Sonya Terrell at
7:42 AM
5 Comments:
Man, that's good! I am going through Acts right now with two of my friends. We also are reading Psalms and Proverbs to go with it. We have found an awesome system to hold us accountable and it is working. At first I was dreading it because I didn't look forward to Acts. "What can I learn from Acts?" I thought. But the Holy Spirit reminded me that all word is living and breathing. So I may not remember what I read or feel like I have gotten anything from it but it is a living word so I can't help but to be changed. Oh and I am loving Acts but it helps to have a commentary too. God is speaking to me! Sorry for the ramble! God is so faithful!
Finding time to get in the wordis my biggest struggle. I suck at time management. this new year I am striving to make time, I know how vital it is to my growth.
I like that, Sonya... our love letters... good stuff. thanks for the reminder.
How greatly put... pray for me as I try to read more of the bible this year. I really struggle with putting this first --- before anything else. I find if I don't do it first thing it doesn't get done.
read a little, live it a little, read a little more, live it a little more.
a big bag of seeds thrown on the grown will not yield a plant for every seed, but a seed carefully planted in the right soil and fed with water will grow. And that takes a little time.
God will grow us in the way we need to grow. We will not always grow the same way or at the same rate as others.
I've struggled at times because I thought someone was growing faster than me; be it zeal or giftings, etc.
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